We have generally tried to depend on the force of argument to win the day against the structural forces that have driven this decline. Yet foundations generally operates from a position of relative weakness in schools of education: we provide service to programs but generally do not have our own strong programs. We “take” enrollment from other departments, but do not “give” enrollment to them or bring independent enrollment to the school. This leaves foundations in a position of dependency. The core argument of this paper is that we need to move beyond dependency toward a vision of foundations as, at least in part, a provider of robust (if collaborative) programs of its own, and we discuss a range of strategies designed to foster the development of such programs. Amidst the current environment, we believe that foundations will find it increasingly difficult to make our arguments stick without the associated power to make ourselves heard
